The people at the Social Security Administration are coached not to give you advice but to pass out information. That becomes problematic if you’re divorced or widowed when it comes to making the right choice as to when you take your social security. The Social Security Administration takes an issue (Social Security) that’s already complex and has a lot of issues to it, adds in the complexity of being divorced or widowed, and they make it even more complex. I’m going to try to unravel some of those complexities for you. First, let me address those of you who may have been divorced. There are some qualifications. The qualifications are these, 1) You’ve had to be married at least 10 years. 2) You must be single, at least right now, 3) You have to be at least 62 and, 4) Your ex-spouse has to be at least 62.

You may be eligible to get up to 50% of the benefit of an ex-spouse. For instance, I had a 61-year-old lady came in recently and she said, “We had five children. My husband was an attorney, and he really took me to the ringer when it came to getting my divorce and getting the settlement put together. His social security, because he was an attorney, made lots of money and he was the sole breadwinner of the house was up here and my social security, I did work a few jobs outside the home, I did do a great job raising 5 kids, but in raising the kids I didn’t pay into Social Security, so my benefits will be way down here while his is way up high.”

I was able to show her that if she wanted to turn on her Social Security draw at 62, because the ex was 62 already, she could bump up to 50% of what his draw would be. She was so happy. The only thing that disappointed her was that it wouldn’t affect him. That’s the thing you need to understand, by you taking a spousal benefit from your Ex, it’s not going to affect your ex-spouse’s social security. In fact, they may not even know about it. So, it’s not going to negatively impact them and there’s nothing they can do to stop you or fight you from getting it. It is a right you have.

Now, the Social Security Administration may tell you that there is an ex-spouse divorced benefit, but they won’t tell you how to get it. For instance, if your social security is more than half of his or hers, if it’s more than 50% of theirs, Social Security won’t give you the spousal benefit. They’ll only give you your benefit. They’ll give you whichever’s higher, 50% or more, but if you’re below 50% of what that ex-spouse’s social security will be, they will bump you up to 50% of theirs. It’s a great way to legally get more money out of the Social Security Administration that you rightfully deserve and have earned because you stayed at home and raised the children while they worked and had the bigger income.

It is rightfully yours. You need to get it. You need to ask for it.

Now, if you’re a survivor and you have lost your mate, you’ve lost your husband or your wife, it may be at age 60, 62, or more. You may want to start drawing theirs. It may be the best strategy to get the most money out of Social Security. You may want to draw your survivor benefit first from losing that partner, and if that is what’s best for you, they will turn on your survivor benefit. What does that do to your own benefit? It allows it to keep growing perhaps all the way until age 70, and even if it’s more, you could wait when it passes your survivor benefit. You could turn it on at that point, say 64, 65, 66. I’ve had people who’ve turned it on at all of these ages, but if that survivor benefit was enough for them to live off of, they allowed their own benefit to grow all the way until age 70, then turned off the survivor benefit and turned on their own benefit at a much higher rate.

This is just another strategy to put more money in your pocket this time. If you’re widowed and you’ve lost a mate, maybe you’re sitting out there and you’re saying, I don’t know. This is pretty complex. You’re right, it is. It’s not just the complexity of social security of when to turn it on, of turning it on at 62, full retirement age or at 70. If you’re married, turning it on off of a spouse, you’re either widowed or you’re divorced if you’re watching this, and so you’ve got another complexity and that is playing off of your deceased partner or playing off of your ex-partner. So yours is even more complex. You’ve got not only all the options and complexities of other people, but you’ve got an added complexity level there because of what you’ve been through. Let us help you, let us walk you through this.

That’s why we’re here. That’s why we exist so that you can get the most out of your social security that you legally are eligible to get. You’d be so surprised at how many people, I wish I had a statistic that we’ve run through the years, they’ve been drawing this much from social security thinking that was the max and they’ve come in or they planned on drawing this much and they’ve come in and we were able to show them how using the rules of the Social Security Administration itself, they can bump up to even a higher monthly earning. We want you to have a better life. We want you to have sufficient income for the rest of your life. Reach out to us so we can help you. Hey, I hope this was helpful. If you want to see more about how we help our clients, go to our website, www.mosleywealthmanagement.com. And if you want more information about what we’ve talked about today, give us a call. I promise you every single week, if you’ll give me eight to 10 minutes, I’ll do my best to increase your financial knowledge and help you ease into retirement.